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| December 19, 2005 | Monday | Ziqa’ad 16, 1426 |
Life returning to normal in quake-hit villages: Middlemen cashing in on people’s misery
SHAWAL MAIDAN (Bala-kot), Dec 18: Life is returning to normal in this quake-hit village as a child is seen running across an abandoned corn field, a foal just bolts away and a cow mows as a USAID helicopter lands at an emergency strip stirring a storm of dust and dried corn roots.
“You only realize the enormity of the situation after you fly over places like Balakot and Bagh,” said Col Bob Johnson, a US Army aviation officer, whose team flies 40 sorties a day to bring supplies to the earthquake victims. He hopes to increase it soon to 60 sorties a day.
Col Johnson, who arrived here on Nov 6, said he had heard that the Oct 8 quake was devastating but never thought it would be so bad. His team has already brought thousands of tons of supplies for the victims, including tents, clothes, food and galvanized iron sheets.
“But none of this is reaching us,” complained Maskeen Swati, who had camped near the army storage facility at Shawal Maidan with his and 30 other families. They walked eight kilometres from the Kaghan valley to reach here with their women, children and a lonely cow.
Hanif Khan, another quake victim at nearby Shinkiari, said: “I don’t know who is getting all these supplies. They are not reaching us.”
Sean Collins of Mercy International acknowledged that people living at lower altitudes were not getting as much assistance as they needed. Both government and private relief agencies were temporarily focused on providing relief to those living on higher altitudes because of time constraints, he said and added: “We want to get there before the snow does.”
People, however, are not waiting for relief. Flying over the Neelum and Jhelum valleys, a media team watches hundreds of terraces freshly prepared for the next crop. Geometrical patterns of finely ploughed fields reflect the human desire to overcome all disasters.
Muzaffarabad is not yet the busy city once it was, but is bouncing back to life.
An oil tanker negotiates tricky mountain roads, made more precarious by the earthquake. Shinny tin-roofs are beginning to replace those that caved in during the quake. Commercial vehicles and private cars are also back on the roads.
Streams and rivers weave in and out of narrow mountain passes as the Chinook Ch-47 helicopter carrying the supplies and the media team turns towards Mansehra. Tall pines bend as the helicopter flies over them and swing back to their stately shapes.
Villagers watch cautiously as journalists emerge from the chopper’s belly at Shawal Maidan. One of them covers a reporter under his chador as another helicopter lands, stirring more dust.
“See all this food and yet nothing for us,” says Nazeer Swati. There are other families in the area too, all complaining that they are getting no assistance. Each chopper has brought two huge bundles of supplies carrying tons of food. “It is easy to guess what brought the victims to the base but so far we have only received tents and some wheat,” Mr Swati said.
At Shinkiari, Mohabbat Khan has other worries. “Supplies are reaching his village, Chatta, but middlemen are exploiting innocent villagers,” he said.
The government has distributed cheques of Rs25,000 each among those who have lost their homes.
“Since most of these people do not have bank accounts, the middlemen say to them, you take Rs15,000 and give us Rs10,000 and we will cash the cheque for you,” Mr Khan said and added: “Some of them are also charging Rs400 for each tent they distribute.”
He described the middlemen as local thugs and said that educated people who had no sympathy for the poor villagers.
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